Enthusiasm for this approach is echoing across coastal Brooklyn, as nonprofits and residents are energizing around the new coalitions. Their work is well underway—Coney Recovers is establishing the Coney Corps to get locals back to work and involved in rebuilding and Red Hook Coalition has hired a coordinator to work among the groups and identify local employment opportunities.

Beyond these coalitions, Brooklyn Recovery Fund’s support to individual groups has also proved vital.

“A hurricane is hard for everybody—but for the developmentally disabled, change is really a problem,” caretaker Sabrina White told the Daily News. “We’re taking it one day at a time — that’s all we can do.”

With your support, they’re getting closer to home: Brooklyn Recovery Fund has awarded Mercy Home a $10,000 grant to help pay for repairs.

Elsewhere…

In Coney Island, Brooklyn Recovery Fund’s grant to Coney Island Gospel Assembly paid for a forklift rental to unload the tons of supplies that have been delivered to the church’s parking lot, which has become a major relief distribution center.

In Gerritsen Beach, funds have helped 40 local homes get power, whose residents include an 81-year old woman with breast cancer, a Marine about to be deployed overseas, and a woman whose house the City had condemned but can in fact be relatively easily salvaged.

In Central Brooklyn, an area spared by the storm, funds have addressed the huge increase in demand on food pantries and soup kitchens since Sandy. St. John’s Bread and Life has given out 117% more food in the two weeks following the hurricane than usual, representing not only their relief work in Coney and the Rockaways , but the fact that many storm evacuees ended up with family and friends in Bed Stuy. The Bed Stuy Campaign Against Hunger typically sees 200-300 new families per month—in the three weeks after Sandy, they saw 651 new families.

These stories demonstrate the importance of our local nonprofits and community-backed recovery. We encourage you to share them, and ask your friends and family to support our efforts.

Via our Do Good Right Here volunteer initiative and website, we're tracking volunteer and supply donation needs across Brooklyn in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. Visit our blog at DoGoodRightHere.org for a thorough list of opportunities to volunteer. Email volunteer@bcfny.org if you are collecting donations or know of immediate volunteers needs.